Nationwide question

Bargain_Rzl

Hi everybody,

Just a quick one.

I've now made three overpayments on my Nationwide mortgage, of £500 in each of the last 3 months.

My understanding was that (unless I made a specific request for the term to be reduced instead) the basic monthly payment would be recalculated every time a £500 O/P was made.

In actual fact, my monthly payment was recalculated after my first O/P (went down from £299 to £296) but has not been recalculated again since.

Is there a reason for this or should I query it with them? Do they have a limit on how frequently the recalculation is done?

moominyak

Hi BR,

Firstly, well done you :T

Secondly... erm... I dunno I'm with the Hfx and they revised my monthly payment after the first OP back in Feb/Mar (the OP was £250) but I've heard nothing since, even though my total OPs come to over £1000 to date.

EDIT: Just checked, I'd OP'd £570 during Feb-May, and the June payment was at the 'new' lower amount, so maybe a cumulative OP of £500 (or more) was the trigger. I've OP'd another £740 in Jun-Aug and haven't had any more revisions, but I've just started a new product from 1st Aug so I'm guessing that the OPs will have been taken account of when they worked out my new monthly payment. I'll need to OP another £440 (Aug OP only £60 so far) to test my theory - I'm not bothered enough to take my own advice and call them, especially from an open plan office!

I keep an eye on it online, and the OPs are definitely coming off, so I'm not too bothered as I want to keep the payments static anyway.

If you're at all concerned about what's going on, my advice is to ring them.

HTH

Bargain_Rzl

The thing is with Nationwide, when you're on a fixed rate, £500 exactly is both the maximum overpayment in any given month and the trigger point for getting the monthly payment updated instead of the term.

I'll phone them tomorrow (I don't have my account number on me today) because one niggling concern is that I might technically be overpaying mopre than my limit (on this reasoning: if my monthly payment has been held at £296 but in fact should have been revised down to £289, and I'm plugging in an extra £500 a month on top of that, then technically this month I will have overpaid by £507, if you see what I mean - though if they've made a mistake I can't see them making any fees stick).

moominyak

oic

My OP limit is 10% pa, but tbh £500 pcm would be more than sufficient!

Let us know what they say

TeresaO

Hi,

I think that Nationwide assume that you want the payments reduced and not the term of the mortgage. This happened to us when we made £500 OPs. We simply told them that we wanted the term reduced and not the payment, which was fine. So just give them a call ( you may need to follow up with a letter)

all the best

T

Bargain_Rzl

Yes but the point is they HAVEN'T been reducing my monthly payments. Not since June, anyway, when I made the first one.

Forgot to call them today as well, cos I overslept and didn't remember to take my mortgage account number to work with me

elsien

I'm with Nationwide, and I overpay every month by £70. I'm on the fixed rate, and they've never adjusted the payments (unless I specifically asked.) The payments do show up on the annual statement though and are taken into account re daily interest.
In my case it meant when I got to the end of the fixed term I owed less than I thought, so I'm happy to let them carry on as they are. I think they assume that when you signed up to the fixed rate, you agreed to leave the payments as they were, and they adjust whatever needs doing at the end of the term.

Bargain_Rzl

Hi elsien - the difference is that you're overpaying less than £500 a month, so I wouldn't expect them to adjust monthly payments except on specific request. For £500 overpayments my expectation was that every overpayment would result in a recalculation, which for me has happened once but remained unchanged since (despite 3 x £500 overpayments)...

ailuro2

If you can afford it,and are allowed to, then leave the payment as it is - that way you're overpaying by more every month - so when your payment should be £10 less because you paid the same it's a £10 overpasyment.

Not sure if you'll be allowed to, worth mentioning though!

Bargain_Rzl

Hi ailuro2 - while I do understand what you're saying, one of the reasons I am diverting ALL my savings into my mortgage at the moment is so that when my fixed rate ends in November - and I'll be looking at a rate of probably 2% higher - my basic monthly payments will remain roughly the same as they are now.

Kantankrus_Mare

I get what you mean BR :rotfl:

Only because I was planning on doing exactly the same thing to bring my monthly payments to a level that Im happy with.

I also understood it to mean that every over payment of £500 or more would lead to a reduction in monthly payments. Out of interest, and if you dont mind me asking, what is the amount of your mortgage..........just so i can see if it would be worth me making the over payments.

Would be interested to hear the outcome of your call to Nationwide as well.